Epilogue

AN: Well this wraps up the Prart Arc and the END of Act II. Truly a joy to write, yet also I must mourn the end of another part of this grand experience. Remedios is dead, Astraka... wishes he was. (He'll pop up in the occasional short cameo) and some characters parts in the story will change dramatically, new characters and new goals will challenge established figures, old ones who still live will struggle on, and you will continue to find that what doesn't change about war, is that it changes people, and forces those who live through it, to ask how they can live with themselves afterward.

Reviews are welcome of course, and in answer to those who asked, I'm an American. If you have questions, easiest to send them to my pm box. If you want to support this project's expansion to other media, well you know how if you're reading author notes. :) If you want to hang out, get help with your own story, etc. well join the Overlord Fanfiction discord. Have a great day.

...Prart...

The next two days were hectic ones, but if anyone cared about the pace of their labor, nobody said it. If anything, a renewed spirit of hope and optimism swept through the streets, and even the growing winter chill could not dampen the fires of their enthusiasm. People, even peasants, walked brashly and boldly through the streets, their heads held high as if they were the highest of nobles.

Every citizen who had drawn a bow or fletched an arrow felt their part in the victory. Those who ran food to the walls would show their children the path they took to feed the defenders, and those who repaired damaged swords would bequeath their hammers to their children as heirlooms that had preserved the city. Those who tended the wounded did not wish the stains of blood removed from their clothing, it was a mark of honor that they wore proudly.

The Blood Miners and the Vines were the first units to take initiative in marking the victory. They pooled a small amount of their reward for services rendered and purchased a building in the merchant district, founding a kind of 'club' for the city's veterans.

When Queen Calca learned of its existence, not only did she give her blessing, granting it an official status within the nation as a whole, but she also exempted the organization from taxation as long as they rendered support and services to veterans and their families with their membership dues.

It became the first of its kind, and as they required an official name, they termed themselves 'The New World Veterans Association' and started issuing official cards to everyone who served in a combat capacity. Over the years thereafter, the N.W.V.A. would see chapters spring up around the New World, providing places to drink, eat, or just relax, becoming popular waystations for soldiers of all types.

These, unsurprisingly to Neia, became the hubs of social change, as lizardman, orc, human, and species of all other types, could trade war stories and form common bonds through shared experience, overturning old rivalries and unifying under shared ideals that everyone deserves a place of their own in the world, if they can live and let live.

Ulthis settled in quickly to his task, and though Cersei was rather cross with him for being absent for even longer, she was unsurprised and took it in stride. The performance of the men and women of Kedyn became a thing of legend, their resolute defense of the walls no matter the casualties gave their little city an enormous boost to its reputation, and this would spawn extensive tourism, in particular from Prart, who wanted to see the wall where their reputation truly began.

Burying the dead required a concerted effort, the few priests of the old gods who were still living in Prart buried the dead of their enemies in mass graves not far from the city, giving them only simple cloth wraps for the sake of their dignity, leaving religious symbols alone, but stripping everything else of value. The field they were buried in would become incredibly fertile for many years, but every year on the anniversary of the battle, the field was sanctified again to keep the dead at peace, the reason for this would eventually slip from memory for all but those few immortals who had been present, it became the site of an annual festival where the city's culture and heritage was celebrated by its occupants.

Those members of Black Justice who perished but which were not powerful enough to be restored to life were instead dispatched according to their wills. Some had their bodies burned, a mass ceremony held them all in a great pyre that sent so much smoke into the air that it could be seen from Hoburns. Others were taken to a great turning ceremony where they became skeleton laborers and were willed to their families or to the temple.

Those twenty five of the elite hundred who perished were raised from death in Nazarick and rededicated their lives to the Sorcerer King's ideals, a few emerged with new unique abilities, but all were out of the fight for several months as they were retrained under the watchful eyes of Cocytus and Sebas.

The Sons of Iontariil, the Vines, and the Blood Miners who perished were given state funerals and buried at the walls they had died defending, and it became a custom when approaching the walls of Prart, to bow to the walls on either side of the gate, out of respect and reverence for their sacrifice.

The homes and businesses that were destroyed by wayward rocks and magic attacks were rebuilt at the city's expense, drawn from the profits reaped by selling equipment looted from the besiegers' encampments, and the walls were little by little restored to their former glory and Prart was once again made an impressive, powerful fortification that wiped away the stain of its past defeats.

Blue Rose set out that afternoon on undead horses, as fast as their mounts could carry them, they rode faster than the wind, eating and drinking from the saddle, pausing only to relieve themselves or alert the villages that they passed as to what happened. More than once they found a burned out husk and bodies to mark the passing of the southern invasion, but most of the time thanks to the policy of stationing adventurers in villages, when a place was abandoned, there were no bodies, only ruins, suggesting the occupants had been warned in advance and escaped successfully.

While topics were diverse on their restful hours before sleep, two things were frequent occurrences. The first was teasing Evileye over her attraction to Momon. The second revolved around the conflict itself, rehashing and deconstructing the events of the siege to try to make sense of them. The near death of Neia, the fact that an undead monster cradled her like a father would his child, the sheer ferocity of the fighting that had birthed a thousand heroes, the death and restoration of the merchant, all became legends that would be told and retold forever more.

However, for all their talk, some things were always kept private. Lakyus made no mention of her more 'private' conversations seeking spiritual and emotional guidance from the Pope of Black Justice. The long years that Lakyus had spent wounding her sister with her bigotry would not lightly leave her thoughts, and she had begun, in quiet hours, to revisit every kill she'd ever made to wonder if there could have been a peaceful solution.

Though tears were not shed, her thoughts were heavy, and Neia had been patient. Between that and their fighting together, living together, and coming to common ground under a single banner, not to mention the more casual and occasionally humorous moments over dinner, Lakyus had found that, now that she was away, she was missing the company of a good friend.

But as with all such things, it was a bittersweet thing, because of course it meant she had a friend to miss. And when she sat around the fire with her sisters and Gagaran cracked a joke or Evileye was made to blush and the beer flowed like water, she was quick to remember that when you got right down to it, that was really the point of all of this, that was what they meant by making a better world.

...Hoburns…

When word reached the capital of the defeat of the army of the south, the death of Remedios Custodio, and the large scale destruction of the army of the Slane Theocracy, the celebration lasted all day and well into the night. Queen Calca opened the stores of wine in the palace and distributed bottles to every unit, and taverns were open all night long as people traded drinks for stories from the Black Justice units, and their demihuman companions, about all that had transpired.

While at first many were more than a little hesitant about the mixed units, Ba and Robel made a habit of being seen together from the day of their arrival, and had been promoting good will as often as they could. It did not hurt that Black Justice units had spread the word that Ba's demihumans had fought like demons to protect human lives, nor did it hurt that human and demihuman alike wore the symbols of Neia's religion. The military stores of his unit were opened up to the public by special order of the Queen in order that the entire city could feast, and the Black Justice temple that had been forcibly closed was officially reopened by royal decree as soon as the renovations were completed.

Robel was quickly appointed to high command beside the Queen, given the title of Count and awarded the northern lands formerly belonging to Count Handor. The news of the death of Gilcrest in the east and the manner in which he sacrificed himself, and for whom, served as inspiration to nominate him for official martyrdom, a request that would be quickly approved. He had streets and military buildings named after him, but perhaps what would have made him proudest, was that the aqueduct that he'd spent so much time on, in the dark days of the reconstruction, was named for him, with a small plaque added giving the years of his life and his deeds both before and after the war, put right where people would draw water. In time, it became a local tradition that couples from Hoburns who followed Black Justice would bathe their newborns in water drawn from the aqueduct on which a hero had labored, as if they would be washed in his virtues as they were cleaned for the first time.

Robel would never forget the loss of his companion, and kept an empty chair at his table for the rest of his life, even after he married and fathered children. He named his firstborn son 'Gilcrest', his second 'Gascon' and his daughter, at his wife's insistence, was named 'Neia'. He learned to live with the absence of his comrade in arms, as all the living must do, and when Ba eventually settled in the city himself, they would swap stories of the goings on of Commonton, where Gilcrest earned a statue in the town square and grew into something of a local legend that aided in the general unity between humans and nonhumans that both lived in and passed through the area. When his life did finally come to its inevitable end, he would describe it this way… "It was magic sometimes, tragic at others, but it was a good life to the end."

...South of Prart...deep in the woods...

Twenty thousand soldiers were crowded in the woods in the impromptu encampment under the leadership of Yuri and Suchala, and none of them were especially happy. Suchala however, was optimistic. "We lost, but we salvaged a large number of our soldiers." He remarked calmly to Yuri.

"True, but we lost a whole lot more, we never should have listened to Remedios." She sighed and clenched a fist, "True, she was right, it hurt Neia badly, but if I'd been smart I'd have noticed that every time Remedios did something to that woman, that damned undead worshipper only got stronger, more dangerous, and more destructive. What a pain in the ass."

Yuri spat on the ground, annoyed at the memory.

"I'm normally all for blaming Remedios, especially since everything that went wrong was usually her fault somehow," Suchala commented, then shook his head, "But not this time, who could have foreseen that Neia could act as a conduit for the power of the undead?" He asked numbly.

"Tch. Agreed," Clicking her tongue, Yuri grumbled a reply, then asked, "but the question is... now what?"

"We go south. There is still an army there, we make it to the capital, declare southern independence from the north, and try to negotiate that without violence." Suchala explained, "If Calca accepts, then that will hamstring the Sorcerer King."

"Why in the eyes of the gods would she ever accept that?" Yuri asked incredulously.

"Because we don't have to win in order to deprive her of victory." He said. "True her amnesty will have appealed to many nobles, and I'm sure some will take it, perhaps even most, but if we take a few hostages, we might be able to force their hand, the South has never had a firm connection to the North, so independence will appeal to that sentiment. We don't have to defeat her, we just have to fight her. If she wants to rebuild her nation quickly, well the south had cut off the north before, perhaps the north will be willing to cut off the south now."

"You don't think they'll want revenge for the burnings?" Yuri asked as she took a swig from her water skin.

"Neia solved that problem for us, that was Remedios, and Remedios is dead. So the focus of revenge is now gone, if she were still alive, we could have just used turning her over as a bargaining chip." Suchala said with a casual ruthlessness Yuri appreciated.

"Maybe, but who do we put up for the throne?" She asked. "We don't know what happened to Astraka, we never did find his body, even if we didn't have long to look." She set her water skin aside and broke off a piece of bread from a loaf, she handed one to Suchala and started chewing the rest herself.

"That is for the better." Suchala said, taking the piece with a thankful nod. He took a bite, "Hard stuff, never liked it, but it beats eating arrows." He said with grim humor, she laughed a little and nodded in agreement as she tore a chunk off with her teeth.

"Astraka lost his entire army, he didn't win a single battle, even if it wasn't always his fault, the reality is that if we had him back, he'd be useful only the way Remedios would be, trading him away. So we need someone else, someone from the south. Do you think his family would be willing?" Suchala asked.

Yuri shook her head, "No, I'm from the south, there isn't much chance of that, family is a big deal there, if his family head has accepted the amnesty, none of the rest will buck him. You'll need to find somebody that the Queen doesn't have a personal grudge against, who hasn't outraged the Sorcerer King, who can be made peace with amicably. Find that person, and we find a way to get out from under this. But we'd better find them fast, once the invasion begins in earnest, we'll have a very hard time convincing them to call it off."

Suchala had a grim expression on his face as she spoke. "How did it come to this?" He asked out loud, and for that, Yuri had no answer. They ate the rest of their 'meal' in silence.

...Suchala's Encampment...

Stauc wasn't happy. As the head of the Holocaust Scripture, he'd had several important jobs, and not many of them had gone well. His unhappiness showed on his face as he chewed on a tough hunk of meat.

"Quit looking so sour, you're sour enough that you'll spoil the damned meat." Shala replied unhappily. She looked at him with annoyance.

"How exactly should I look?" Stauc retorted with bitterness in his voice. His worn leathery skin had seen better years, but the toughness of his hide was evident on his face. He had short sandy hair and blue eyes that might have marked him as handsome in his youth, but which had become as hard as his face had become care worn. Shala was his opposite, young and of pale skin and black hair, her ample time in the woods had kept her free of the burden of the sun's rays, and she wore all of her twenty-two years of life with great vigor. Her green eyes were lively and energetic even at the worst of times, and that included these.

She shrugged. "I don't know, but maybe not like that?" She said dismissively.

"Half of our numbers are dead, and what have we to show for it?" He asked furiously as he tore off another chunk of meat.

"The knowledge that they have people who can kill us?" She said casually. "Did you really expect some other end than a violent death?" She asked, looking him in the eyes.

"No, but not like this. Taus and Nerina had their heads blown apart, what kind of weapon does that? But arguably worse than that..." He trailed off and his mind flew back to the battlefield...

...The Battle at Prart...The Previous Day...

"Don't let them penetrate the line! Hold firm! Hold firm!" Stauc shouted just before the Black Justice elites drew close. He watched as Taus, a behemoth of a man with two longswords who was accustomed to opponents who used shields, clearly seemed confounded by someone who did not, but nonetheless stopped every strike he threw at them. The soldier of Black Justice wore armor that glowed with enchantments, he moved like he wasn't wearing any armor at all, and his leather glove was somehow as hard as steel.

Stauc saw that he found that out the hard way when that palm opened and stopped a slash by intercepting it at the wrist, Taus responded like he'd slammed his arm against a stone wall and he fell back several steps in obvious pain. They both knew immediately he was facing one of the hundred, few enough of those were around that their reputations, equipment, and general methods were now well known. Stauc periodically lost eyes on Taus as he struggled against a wave of undead skeletons, not particularly dangerous individually, but a problem in numbers, especially with many other more dangerous enemies around.

He regained sight on his man when he saw Taus flying head over heels into the dirt, the elite that had sent him soaring moved in for the kill, and desperate to save his comrade, Stauc rushed in and engaged the elite himself before the final blow could be delivered.

That was when he'd learned how difficult it was to combat the unique method of Neia's elites. The Black Justice soldier swapped from blade to bow and then to grappling when Stauc came close, but every grapple was a means to resort to a weapon. It was like it was tailor-made to combat the Theocracy's elites in turn. Taus got to his feet and together they might have made short work of the elite, only for Taus' head to suddenly explode like a placid lake when a rock was thrown in to disturb it.

A stream of combatants flowed between the two, and Stauc lost track of the elite he'd attempted to strike down, only to find himself facing two orcs with heavy weapons that steadily pushed him back, he used every martial art he could, and though he dispatched them, it was clear that he was being forced back.

He was still feeling the heavy drain of the terrible pressure that the undead worshipper had somehow brought down on him and all his people, more than once he found a body that had no evident injury, but was nonetheless quite dead. The army fought around him with the courage of desperation, and that was a courage the Holocaust Scripture had grown to know all too well in this war.

Shala found herself in the unenviable position of fighting two elites by herself. She could not suppress the thought that it was very unfair, but if they were interested in her opinion, then they would have asked her what she thought. They fought in tandem, with one attacking at an angle while the other used his bow at a distance, they kept from getting in each other's way, while also supporting each other's counter attacks, it was clear that this was the fruit of countless hours of training. Had they not been using it to try to kill her... well, she would have praised them for it. As it was, she was doing her best to use the terrain... which in this case meant other soldiers, to interfere with the archer's ability to gain a target. Occasionally all three combatants were forced to disengage to deal with another threat, but the three of them must have 'danced' for a solid five minutes before Remedios had pushed her out of the way to make way for herself and forced them onto the defensive themselves.

Shala had lost sight of them then, but as she saw their bodies a few minutes later when moving to another foe, she could only assume that Remedios Custodio had been able to finish them alone

Steadily the scripture had been forced back, between the weight of numbers, magic, and the considerable power of some of their opponents, it gradually became clear to the woman that they were in very big trouble. At one point she had broken out of the line, and caught a glimpse at a battle she would never forget, Remedios Custodio was embroiled in combat against two figures, and she instantly knew who they had to be. The seamless teamwork was disgustingly familiar, but also awe inspiring, but the worst was when she saw the unusual attack... or skill, or whatever it was that Neia had used that shredded the body of the former Paladin commander, while the Paladin's famous 'Holy Strike' only brought laughter from Remedios' opponents.

For almost two full minutes she was uninterrupted as she watched the fight unfold and could not look away, in that she was not alone, she noticed two of her opposite numbers were similarly transfixed, and though they saw one another, it was as if they had come to a silent truce to watch a battle of heroes play out before their eyes. When Remedios finally fell and Shala saw Neia thrust that sword into her neck and sever the thread of life that bound her to the mortal world, the Holocaust Scripture member was certain the battle was over in fact, if not in name. When she saw the two leave and be joined by a figure she recognized from her intelligence reports as a maid demon of Jaldabaoth, she'd immediately rushed and grabbed those comrades she could find and started to pull them back for the escape. Had she not, she was sure she would have ended up laying among the dead.

...Present...

Stauc was still grumbling and Shala was still sighing.

"Look, we got out, retreat isn't the same as defeat... And yes, we lost that battle, but we're not beaten, so we can still do something to salvage this. General Suchala will get us south, we'll link up with the elites of the Black Scripture, rally to whatever army is still in the South, and if we just win one big fight we'll be fine." Shala said with the positivity that annoyed Stauc to no end.

"Maybe, but there is no denying we lost today, and I reserve the right to be pissed off about it." Stauc grumbled frustratedly.

Shala sighed in annoyance. "If that makes you happy..." She rolled her eyes and went to lie down. A few hours sleep would do her good, she probably wouldn't get it, but even a short nap would do her some good, so she'd take what she could get.